Tabletop X-ray device rivals world's largest machines

The image shows an x-ray radiograph of a resolution test target, with features as small as 3 micrometer. It demonstrates that the x-rays produced with a table-top laser plasma interaction have a source size of around one micrometer and a peak brightness comparable to 3rd generation synchrotrons. The image was taken in a single shot exposure of 30 femtoseconds.

The new deviceÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s X-rays have an extremely short pulse length, and originate from a point only about one micron in width. This results in an unusually narrow beam, which allows users to see finer details than other technologies permit. Because the pulses are so short, users could even measure atomic and molecular interactions that occur on a femtosecond (one quadrillionth of a second) timescale.

The team started with an experiment at the University of Michigan, in which they shone a very high power laser beam into a jet of helium gas. This created a tiny column of ionised helium plasma. Within that column, the laser pulse created a bubble of positively charged helium ions surrounded by a sheath of negatively charged electrons. Because of the separation of positive and negative charges, the bubble contained powerful electrical fields that accelerated some of the plasmaÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s electrons to form an energetic beam, while also causing that beam to wiggle. That wiggling produced a Ã¢â‚¬Å“highly collimated co-propagating X-ray beam,Ã¢â‚¬ï¿½ which is at the heart of the device.

It is a process similar to that which happens in conventional synchrotron machines, but on a much smaller scale Ã¢â‚¬â€œ the UKÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s Diamond Light Source synchrotron is half a kilometer (547 yards) in circumference, while the new device is housed in a vacuum chamber that measures about one meter (3.28 feet) on each side, with the acceleration and X-ray production happening over an area of less than a centimeter.

Ã¢â‚¬Å“This is a very exciting development,Ã¢â‚¬ï¿½ said the studyÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s lead author Dr. Stefan Kneip, of Imperial College. Ã¢â‚¬Å“We have taken the first steps to making it much easier and cheaper to produce very high energy, high quality X-rays. Extraordinarily, the inherent properties of our relatively simple system generates, in a few millimeters, a high quality X-ray beam that rivals beams produced from synchrotron sources that are hundreds of meters long. Although our technique will not now directly compete with the few large X-ray sources around the world, for some applications it will enable important measurements which have not been possible until now.Ã¢â‚¬ï¿½

An experienced freelance writer, videographer and television producer, Ben's interest in all forms of innovation is particularly fanatical when it comes to human-powered transportation, film-making gear, environmentally-friendly technologies and anything that's designed to go underwater. He lives in Edmonton, Alberta, where he spends a lot of time going over the handlebars of his mountain bike, hanging out in off-leash parks, and wishing the Pacific Ocean wasn't so far away. All articles by Ben CoxworthFollow @bencoxworth

Photon Theraphy pioneered in the USA is the most successful cancer treatment so far.

It has a 90% success rate for most cancers. Unfortunately these machines weigh some 10 tons & cost around 8 million to build. The photons it fires kill cancer readily with-out any side effects. It does not harm healthy cells.

Maybe it is possible to adapt the desk top machine to do the same job. I assume x-rays can be eliminated & photons produced instead.

After all photons r only light.

Cheers Kiwi

John M 26th October, 2010 @ 10:46 am PDT

John M, do you perhaps mean "proton therapy" ? And since they are ionized protons they can be more finely focused than traditional radiation treatment which uses neutron radiation.